[Advaita-l] <bhavatitva> and <astitva>: request for help

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

Dear Sri Jivadas,

That was highly thought-provoking. Between the two poles of being and 
becoming, a reflection on language leads one naturally to the philosophical 
thinking.

>I have a view that an <Asana> is where one <asti>, but where does one 
><bhavati>? These thoughts arose while I was laboring over a <zloka> from 
>the <mahA-rAmAyaNa-yoga-vAsiSTha>, in the sixth book, the first half of the 
>Nirvana-teaching.
>

kutra bhavati? svAtmani. kena bhavati? svAtmanA ... Forms of the root bhU 
are not absent in the upanishat texts, when talking of AtmA and brahma, e.g. 
brahmaiva bhavati.

Another interesting grammatical fact that points to a close connection 
between forms of root "as" and forms of root "bhU" - there is no clear 
future tense form of the root as. Rather one turns to the root bhU and uses 
only bhavishyati, bhavishyasi, bhavishyAmi as the future tense forms.

Another point with respect to the omission of verbal forms of is/am/are - 
this causes particular problems when translating into English from any old 
language. However, even in English, while you cannot construct a sentence 
without the verb being there explicitly, one can still omit the existential 
verb and place nouns (or noun phrases) in apposition to each other. e.g.

I, Vidyasankar, son of Sundaresan, am a moderator of this list.

which is equivalent to

I, (who am) Vidyasankar, (and who am) the son of Sundaresan, ...

This kind of syntax, even in contemporary English, still retains the form of 
"aham AtmA guDAkeSa ..."

Regards,
Vidyasankar

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